The Easton Area School District has set June 6th for the start of class 2022.
It is the first traditional graduation since 2019, with graduate parades in 2020 and 2021, symbolizing pomp and circumstance due to the coronavirus pandemic.
It is slated to be held at Cottingham Stadium in the Easton district, which has been refurbished for $ 16 million for the school year.
Easton Area High School principal Kyle Geiger announced the plans during the school committee’s standing committee meeting Tuesday evening.
The last time an Easton Area class started in Cottingham was in the 1980s, Geiger said. The Red Rovers recently celebrated their diplomas in the Stabler Arena at Lehigh University. Since the beginning of 2022 has been moved outdoors, the district set June 7th as the rainy date.
The event will be broadcast live, said Geiger.
“I know that many students and families will be happy to finally have an appointment on their calendar,” he said during the meeting on Tuesday. “And if we’re all silent now, we might hear Snapchat and Twitter and everything else if that word gets around.”
Another sign of a hopefully return to normal amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, on January 25th, school officials will be asked to approve cheerleading team trips to Orlando, Florida, February 9-14, to attend the UCA to participate in the National High School Championship Competition and through the district’s baseball program to Cooperstown, New York, April 30 through May 2, to play at the National Baseball Hall of Fame’s historic Doubleday Field. All expenses are borne by the cheerleading and baseball booster clubs and families, except for the referee fees for the baseball trip; these are shared between the sports departments of the Easton Area School District and its partner school for the trip, Voorhees High School in Hunterdon County. Jim Pokrivsak, Athletic Director of Easton Area, is also seeking approval to attend the Pa’s conference on Jan. 25. State Athletic Directors Association March 16-18 in Hershey for $ 853.
In other business Tuesday:
- Easton Area School District consulting engineer Joshua Grice of D’Huy Engineering Inc. said construction of the new Palmer Elementary School is underway for its scheduled opening early in the 2023-24 school year. This is despite contractors having issues with material availability and price increases, he said. The structural steel is ready and the big push now is to install the roof and put up the outside walls so the interior work can begin, Grice said.
- District CFO Michael Sokoloski said the board would be asked to vote at its January 25 meeting to cap the district’s budget tax hike to 4.4% for 2022-23. That is the maximum increment on the district index for the next school year under Pennsylvania’s 2006 Special Session Act 1. An increase in taxes above the index would require a referendum. A 4.4% tax increase is roughly $ 2.8 million and would raise about $ 4.5 million for district spending, he said. A grinder costs $ 1 in tax for every $ 1,000 of property tax assessment, so a property owner with a $ 50,000 assessment under the proposal would pay about $ 140 more in school taxes.
You can follow Tuesday’s standing committee meeting on YouTube:
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Kurt Bresswein can be reached at [email protected].
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